1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to constructional kits intended principally but not exclusively for building model structures such as houses, doll houses, airplanes, boats, rockets, furniture and many others. The kit may also be used to build educational structures, such as blocks, spelling and number lines and the like.
2. Prior Art
Many different kinds of constructional kits have been available over the years, with which children of all ages can construct model structures. Some require the use of nuts and bolts, some require the stacking of "logs", some utilize plastic bricks with interfitting pins and sockets and still others utilize other arrangements. For the most part, each kind of kit is suitable for constructing only one type of model structure, for example, only buildings, only houses, only log cabins and forts, and so on. Some provide the skeletons of structures whereas others provide walls without supporting skeletons. Very few are suitable to build various kinds of structures as the respective components of the kits are too specialized.
This invention recognizes the need for a constructional kit which can be used to construct the widest possible variety of structures, including but not limited to houses, airplanes, boats, rockets, doll furniture, educational structures and the like. It further recognizes the need to provide such a variety with the smallest possible number of constituent elements, in order to simplify construction and emphasize versatility. It would appear that these two contrary objectives, namely a wide variety of possible structures and the smallest variety of constituent elements would be contradictory, and this has proved to be the case in constructional kits known heretofore. In this invention, there are only two basic units of construction. One unit is an elongated connector and the other is a panel. The panels are provided in three basic shapes, squares, rectangles and triangles. The rectangles are one half the size of the squares and the triangles are equivalent to the squares being cut in half diagonally. Some of the rectangles are provided with pins for pivotal mounting, to simulate doors and windows. Each of the elongated connectors is provided with a number of longitudinal grooves, into which any of the panels may be pressibly fitted. The elongated connectors are also provided with holes into which the pin-bearing panels may be pivotally disposed. Each of the elongated connectors is substantially identical in size and shape, within manufacturing tolerances of course. While three panel shapes are provided, many structures may easily be constructed, for example, with only the square panels. Nevertheless, each of the flat panels is connectable in the same fashion. Despite this very small variety of constituent elements, the widest possible variety of structures can nevertheless be constructed.